ANNIE HECKMAN

The last few weeks have been bone imagery overload for me! So it was particularly appropriate when the wonderful Deanna Krueger (whose friendship I enjoy on Facebook as well as in real life here in Chicago) posted a link to this video on Facebook after seeing my in-progress shots of the paper bone installation. Thank you Deanna! After, ahem, drawing a ton of bones, I’m impressed with how the animation shows the movement believably without detailing every digit. Enjoy.

You thought that you were alone but I caught your bullet just in time (in progress, darkened view), 2009, paper, graphite, phosphorescent paint, dimensions variable

You’re cordially invited to attend the upcoming exhibition, For a Limited Time Only, featuring site-specific ephemeral installations by artists Annie Heckman, Marci Rubin, Jess Witte, Wendy Kveck and Shawn Stucky, curated by Olga Stefan. For a Limited Time Only explores the ephemeral nature of art, and by extension, humanity’s imprint and the artist’s mark, through works that will exist only for the extent of the exhibition.  The projects deteriorate, or even disintegrate completely, during the course of the show. For a Limited Time Only concentrates on the urgency of the work, and encourages the artists, as well as audiences, to consider these projects philosophically, focusing primarily on the idea of the work as temporary experience rather than artistic mark, and memory rather than document.
Catalogue printed on wafer paper with edible inks, with essay by Olga Stefan, and design by Shawn Stucky, will be distributed at the opening.  In keeping with the concept of the exhibit, guests are requested to dispose of and/or consume the catalogue upon reading.

Where:
Art Center Highland Park
1957 Sheridan Road
Highland Park, IL 60035
phone: (847) 432-1888
fax: (847) 432-9106

Our Winter Hours:
Mon-Fri: 9:00am-4:00pm
Sat: 9:00am-3:00pm
When:
March 6-March 29, 2009
Opening Reception: Friday, March 6, 6:30-9pm
Wine and appetizers will be served.

About the artists:
Annie Heckman is an artist based in Chicago with a BFA from the University of Illinois, Chicago and MFA from New York University. Her work explores mortality and afterlife ideologies through sculptural animation installations and works on paper. She has shown her work in numerous spaces, including exhibitions in Chicago, New York City, and Budapest. She is the founder of StepSister Press.

Marci Rubin is a Chicago-based sculptor and printmaker. Her work focuses on transformations through process and materials.  Marci has exhibited throughout the city and has received her MFA from the University of Chicago.  Her work can also be seen at Framing Mode, a business that she manages and owns.

Wendy Kveck is a multi-media artist living and working in Las Vegas, Nevada, but has shown throughout the country, and in Chicago.  Wendy received her MFA at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and her BFA in Painting from The University of Iowa, Iowa City.  Her work focuses on women’s role in society and humanity’s obsession with consumption.

Shawn Stucky is a Chicago-based printmaker.  His work creates a strong connection among music, feelings, and experiences in life. For Shawn, music can create feelings that he cannot manage to put into words, but feels compelled to create art that gives those feelings a tangible form.  Shawn has exhibited at Around The Coyote, the Chicago Art Open, and other venues throughout the city.

Jess Witte is a St. Louis-based artist, originating from Omaha, Nebraska.  She received her MFA from Northern Illinois University.  Her work has been exhibited throughout the Midwest at museums and art organizations.  Her installation, sculpture, and drawing explore control and allude to fixing the transitory.  Jess has been an arts administrator and educator for several years and is currently an art instructor at several venues in St. Louis.

Olga Stefan was the executive director of the Chicago Artists’ Coalition from 2005-2008, and the executive director of Around the Coyote from 1998-2003.  From 2003-2005, while on  maternity leave from full-time work, Olga was Woman Made Gallery’s grant writer.  She has curated several exhibitions, including an international show, “Palpable Disequilibrium: Contemporary Art in Romania” at the Sonnenschein Gallery of Barat College and LIPA Gallery in Chicago, “Resurrection” at Yello Gallery and the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, “Please Print”, “April is the Cruelest Month”, and several others at ATC Space.  She has also served as juror for several festivals, shows, and granting agencies.  Olga currently resides in Zurich, Switzerland and keeps a blog about art, culture, and her travels, Correspondences.

It was about a year ago that I was working with Matthew Dal Santo & Terri L. Russ to put the finishing touches on the book form of Airline to Heaven, Part I. Some of the writings had been in the works for years, but the final words of the preface were written in March of 2008.

Recently I cracked open the book again as I was sorting through some things. I try to check in with all our books regularly to keep cultivating ideas for how to talk about them, promote them, and to decide what to do next. Opening the book quickly became a full read. Do you remember finding writings or drawings you made in 3rd grade when you were already a year older in 4th grade, and being like ‘Oof, this is so embarrassing, who would say that — ugh yech’ etc. etc. This has pretty much consistently happened to me throughout my life (and then after maybe 5 years pass the work becomes a relic of a precious, unknowing, naive time), but I have to say that this book is passing the one-year test very well. Phew.

Darrell Roberts, Chicago City View, 2007, oil on canvas, 10 x 8 inches

This weekend I’ll be making my way over to see a new series of abstractions by Chicago-based Darrell Roberts at Thomas McCormick Gallery in the West Loop. Surface Matters is opening this Friday, February 6, from 5-8 pm. The experience of staring down one of Darrell’s paintings is hallucinatory and tactile; encrusted, vibrating surfaces formed by heavy layers of chunky oil paint fold around the edges of his canvases to make a sculptural form pop from the wall. And the fun he has making them is clear, maybe even without getting to know him — this is someone who really loves to paint and spread the feeling of powerful visual experiences. An archaeological dig for your eyes.

Things have been really busy lately with painting, trimming, and drawing bones, but this being the start of the new year, I’ve resolved to actually finish some of the books I’m reading and learn something during the frenzy. I have to thank the fantastic Krista Hoefle for recently reminding me about Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach (Krista and I are both into creepy, gross stuff, and as such have a special bond — so here’s a shout out to go see her new show). I had seen this book in its famous entry into Six Feet Under when Nate’s niece handed it to him, but just picked up my own copy recently on Krista’s recommendation. It’s excellent. Written in a remarkably entertaining and humorous style given the morbid content, it leads the reader through all variations of what can happen to a cadaver after it’s been donated for science, what happens to your body if you volunteer to be plastinated or included in a bone library — the list goes on. There’s so much information in it that I think I need to go back to reread it some day, but first I have to start up on Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife, another book by Roach that’s sitting next to my bed and at the top of my reading list.